


origin story

by olfrogbait



Category: Phandom/The Fantastic Foursome (YouTube RPF)
Genre: (not as cracky as i initially envisioned but still), Alternate Universe - Superheroes/Superpowers, Crack, Fluff, Humor, Implied Sexual Content, M/M, Swearing
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-02-16
Updated: 2020-02-16
Packaged: 2021-02-28 02:01:56
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,502
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22755958
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/olfrogbait/pseuds/olfrogbait
Summary: (Inspired by Phil's Instagram stories on 2/14/20). Phil grew up with a superhero for a dad, wishing he could have powers of his own. Then he grows up and gets his wish, but it isn't exactly how he imagined it would be.
Relationships: Dan Howell/Phil Lester
Comments: 4
Kudos: 17





	origin story

**Author's Note:**

> Those Instagram stories can be found [here](https://dpstories.tumblr.com/post/190827539246/amazingphils-instagram-story-14022020) and [here](https://dpstories.tumblr.com/post/190828245338/amazingphils-instagram-story-14022020).
> 
> In my defense, I’m an accountant. I shouldn’t be allowed to do words.
> 
> I definitely took some liberties with dnp’s / the Lesters' timeline here, but I wrote this to amuse myself (and it was a success in that regard), so I’m not that sorry.
> 
> But still. Feel free to scream at me on [tumblr](https://olfrogbait.tumblr.com/) if you want.

When Phil was young, he didn’t realize that his dad was different than most people’s dads.

It happened before Phil was born. Martyn was a baby. Nigel and Kath were on holiday on a beach in Florida when a stingray mistook Nigel for a tasty snack and chomped on his ankle. The injury was superficial. It was just a funny story; just the sort of thing that could only happen to a Lester. 

Or at least, that’s all it was at first. But then Nigel started to develop some unusual abilities. And people whose job it was to notice those things _noticed_. And Nigel went from running a small business to traveling around the world to various coastal regions, fighting crime and righting wrongs wherever his particular aquatic-based skill set was needed.

Phil grew up knowing that his dad was a superhero, but he also assumed that _everyone’s_ dad was a superhero. It wasn’t until he started school and other kids started asking questions that he realized his dad was special. And that made Phil want to be special, too.

The thing was, though, no one could just _decide_ to become special. One could neither inheret powers nor acquire them through weedling or force. Something had to _happen_ to you. 

Phil spent a lot of his childhood trying to force something to happen to him. He ate fish food. He peed out of windows when the moon was full. He chased squirrels, secretly hoping one would bite him and he could go fight Tree Crimes in the tropical rainforests of Brazil.

All sorts of bumps and bruises (and occasionally some vomiting) happened to Phil, but nothing _happened_. 

And eventually, Phil grew up. His dreams of becoming a superhero were sublimated into his weird creative projects, and eventually, a burgeoning career as a YouTuber called AmazingPhil. Phil’s parents got older, too; they moved to the Isle of Man so that Nigel could enjoy a quiet retirement but still be near the water.

Adult Phil fancied himself mature and refined and definitely completely over his childhood ambitions of acquiring superpowers.

Then he met Dan.

Dan was loud and brilliant and beautiful. They kissed on the Manchester Eye and Phil’s lips tingled and his heart beat like a sledgehammer in his chest, but it was just a story. Or what he hoped was the beginning of a story of the best kind; the kind that didn’t end.

But then Phil started to experience some … unusual physical developments.

At first he wrote off what he was feeling as normal symptoms of someone who was deliriously smitten. In addition to the tingling and the heart pounding, he felt light all over, like he could float away at any moment. Totally normal young-and-in-love feelings. Right?

Until one day, while making out in the kitchen shortly after moving into their first apartment together, Dan pulled away from Phil, pulled down on the hem of his t-shirt and asked, “What are you standing on?” Because Phil wasn’t supposed to be taller than Dan, but at that moment, he had a solid two inches on him.

Phil’s brain, addled by their current activities, took a moment to engage. When it did, he looked down. Dan’s gaze followed.

Between Phil’s feet and the floor were two or three inches of air, and nothing else.

“What the fuck,” was Dan’s typically eloquent response.

“Um,” Phil agreed.

Dan let go of Phil’s shirt and took a step backward. Phil could feel it as his feet returned to the solid reality of the kitchen floor. 

Phil and Dan stared at each other for a few more moments before Phil said, “So. That happened.”

“Phil.” Dan stepped forward again and grabbed his shoulder. “What. The fuck.”

“I think I should call my dad,” Phil answered.

The ensuing conversation with Nigel did a lot to assure Phil that he wasn’t going crazy, but it didn’t answer as many questions as he or Dan hoped. Yes, Nigel had started experiencing symptoms within weeks of his stingray bite, but it wasn’t unusual for powers to take longer (months or years even) to manifest. No, he’d never heard of someone acquiring powers from another person, rather than an animal or radiation exposure; was Phil sure it was being caused by Dan? Phil was pretty sure he hadn’t been bitten or irradiated without noticing, and there was no denying the connection between his feelings and his symptoms. So yes, he was sure. 

That left: Why? How? And perhaps most urgently, _what now?_

Nigel advised Phil to lay low and not call any attention to himself for the time being. 

“Once they know you’re out there, they’ll want you. You won’t have a lot of choice in the matter. I know this is what you’ve always wanted, but Phil. It’s … it’s hard, not being able to make your own choices anymore. I want you to be careful.”

It was true, this was everything Phil had wanted as a child. Now, he wasn’t so sure. He had YouTube. And his future with Dan. Was he prepared to abandon all that to go fly around and rescue kittens from skyscrapers all day long? I mean, he definitely wouldn’t mind being a badass who rescued kittens on the weekends. Or using his powers in other, non-kitten related ways, based on his own conscience and his own desires. But ... at the constant behest of a slightly ominous and secretive government agency?

“Yeah, Dad. I know. I’ll be careful,” Phil said. And he meant it. He really did.

The thing was, though, there was only so much experimenting you could do with your newly-discovered superpowers while cooped up inside your flat.

Even when those experiments were as exhaustive and pleasurable as they were with Dan.

Yeah, it took Phil awhile to learn how to hover without his lips connected to Dan’s. But did it take as long as he let Dan believe it did? No.

The next step was learning to channel the feeling of lightness that physical proximity to Dan incited in him by concentrating on memories. He would think of Dan’s lips or hands on him (and vice versa) and sure enough gravity would cease to apply to him. It worked, but there were a couple downsides. Namely that he tended to forget what he was doing and bump his head on light fixtures, or drift too close to the balcony (Dan yelled at him repeatedly to keep the door closed), and ... well. Phil didn’t exactly want to be known as the first superhero who got an erection every time he tried to use his powers. 

Boner Man, they’d call him. Or AmazingWood.

“Phil, no. Just … no. Never, ever say those words again,” Dan protested.

Phil just grinned and poked him in the dimple.

Eventually, after months of minor mishaps and innumerable, increasingly terrible innuendos, Phil became familiar enough with the sensations that led to him flying that he could channel them directly. And that wasn’t all. He was stronger now, too. He’d always been tougher than his lanky frame had led people to believe, but now, when his powers were activated, he could lift heavy objects with ease. Heavy objects such as, say, his 6’3” boyfriend. 

They may or may not have discovered this by accident, while doing some highly scientific naked experimenting. It was fine; Phil would just have to be selective about what went into their inevitable biopic. Plus, Dan’s scream when he realized that Phil was the only thing holding him aloft five feet above the couch: priceless.

“I think you broke the sound barrier,” Phil said later, giggling, his tongue poking out from between his teeth.

“Shut _up._ We’ve talked about this.”

They were happy. They were having fun.

Then Phil had one of his stupider ideas. 

“What if,” he said to Dan over breakfast one morning, “we went somewhere.”

Dan paused with a spoonful of Shreddies on the way to his mouth. “I know that being shut-ins is part of our branding, but even for us, leaving the house isn’t _that_ radical of an idea, Phil.”

“No. I mean. What if we went somewhere. Where there aren’t other people. And tried some things.” 

“Things?” Dan asked.

“You know,” Phil answered. He sipped his coffee and attempted to appear nonchalant.

Dan put down his spoon. Serious business. “Phil, your dad said -- it wouldn’t be good. Someone could see. This is London. There are people _everywhere._ ”

“We could leave London. Maybe go visit my parents. There are plenty of deserted beaches on the Isle. My mum’s been pestering me, anyway.”

“Well, I have no arguments against visiting your parents. As for other things --”

“It’ll be totally safe!”

“ -- maybe your dad can talk some sense into you.”

They both knew that talking sense into Phil was easier said than done, but they booked their flight anyway.

Three weeks later, the two of them stood on a beach on the Isle of Man, alone, and resumed the same argument. But Phil could tell he was winning. It helped that it was just a really beautiful day. Unseasonably warm for October, with a nice breeze. The kind of weather that only encouraged romantic and reckless feelings, apparently.

Dan tried to use the breeze as an excuse not to do what they were clearly about to do, but Phil was unmoved.

“You’ve only ever done this indoors. What if you get blown out to sea?”

“I won’t. It’s barely a whisper, not even a real breeze. Anyway, aren’t you coming with me?”

“Oh, so you want company when you drown, do you?”

“We won’t go over the water. Just straight up and back down. As high as those rocks.” Phil pointed at an outcropping on the cliffs behind them.

Dan sighed. Phil knew he’d won.

“Come here,” he said, beckoning Dan towards him. Dan obeyed and allowed himself to be wrapped up in Phil’s arms. He pretended for a moment that this was all that was happening; they were just two idiots on a beach, stupidly in love and unable to keep their hands off of each other. But then Phil’s grip tightened and Dan felt his feet lift off of the rocks. 

He gripped Phil back, even tighter, and whispered in his ear, “I hate you.” He didn’t need to see Phil’s face to know that he was grinning.

Phil stayed true to his word, mostly. They went a little higher than the rocks he’d pointed out, and they drifted in a few small circles, but then Phil lowered them back to the ground. His cheeks were pink and his smile was infectious. Dan couldn’t help but return it.

“Again?” Phil asked.

Dan was about to agree, but then a smudge of darkness against the blue sky and white clouds caught his eye. He looked up and saw a figure in the distance, on top of the cliffs. The smile immediately fell off of his face. 

“Phil. We need to go.” 

“What? Why?

Dan jerked his head. Phil looked and a frown settled on his face as well. “Do you think they saw?”

“Dunno. But we need to go.”

The walk back was tense. Dan was trying really hard not to say ‘I told you so.’ He only succeeded in keeping his lips clamped together because he suspected that Phil’s parents would say it for him.

Sure enough, when Kath heard what had happened, she leveled Phil with a glare that caused him to visibly diminish. “Philip Michael Lester. Did it really not occur to you that your father would be under surveillance here?”

Nigel looked more disappointed than angry (which was, of course, even worse). “Son, people with abilities don’t get to just walk away.”

Phil _hadn’t_ realized that. He took some comfort from the fact that Dan clearly hadn’t either, if his stunned expression was anything to go by. “But why would they follow me? They have no reason to think -- it was probably just someone walking their dog! And they probably didn’t even see anything,” Phil protested.

“Well, dear, we all hope that’s true. But you should prepare yourself. Things might be about to change for you. And Dan,” Kath added, her voice softening a bit at the end. 

Phil knew he’d messed up. He just didn’t know how badly.

The rest of their visit, however, passed without incident. No one came knocking on the door to drag Phil off to a secret government bunker. Kath baked. Nigel gave his son a lot of long, contemplative looks, but otherwise made no further comments. Dan flattered Kath and told her stories about how hopeless Phil was at housework. It felt almost normal. 

Walking back through the door into their London apartment, Phil almost believed that he’d been granted a reprieve. He’d resolved to keep his feet firmly planted on the ground from there on out, literally and figuratively. He wouldn’t play roulette with his future like that again.

Then he saw the envelope.

It had been slotted under their door. Dan saw it at the same time he did and bent down to pick it up. It was a plain white, letter-sized envelope with “Philip Lester” and their address printed in authoritative black type. There was no return address.

Dan looked at him.

“Open it,” Phil said. 

Dan ripped into the envelope and pulled out a single sheet of white paper and handed it to Phil, who took it with a shaking hand. His eyes tracked down the paper quickly. There wasn’t a lot to read. When he finished, he closed his eyes and took a deep breath.

Dan reached out and placed a hand on Phil’s arm. Phil opened his eyes again. He looked at the paper again, then back up at Dan. “They know,” he said, unnecessarily. “They saw me on the Isle. They’re be here in a week to ‘talk to me about the next steps.’”

“They’re going to recruit you.”

“Yeah,” Phil agreed.

“What are you going to do?”

“I don’t know,” Phil said. “But I know I’m not going anywhere without you.”

Dan’s grip on Phil’s arm tightened. “You might not have a choice.”

Phil didn’t answer right away. “We have a week,” he said finally. “Let’s focus on that for now. I’ll figure something out.”

It wasn’t a fun week.

Phil didn’t want to talk about it, and Dan did, so they ended up spending most of their days dancing around each other and bickering when their paths crossed. Which was, of course, all the damn time. Their lives were inextricably entwined. At night, their bodies collided, and all of the pent-up frustration, worry, and desperation was vented in a thoroughly nonverbal manner.

By the fifth day, Phil had made a decision. “I’m going to film a video,” he told Dan. He knew he didn’t have to add that he expected privacy. They respected each other’s creative boundaries, if not many others. Even now, when Dan clearly wanted to grab him and shake him and force him to confront what was happening to them, he didn’t.

He just said, “Okay. Let me know if you need help.”

“Thanks,” Phil said. He attempted a smile, but the look in Dan’s eyes killed it before it could really take hold. “I’ll just, uh -- I’ll see you at dinner. We should order pizza.”

Dan nodded before leaning back into the sofa crease and resuming his Tumblr dive.

Phil went to his room to set up for his video. The idea had come to him at the last minute, but luckily it wouldn’t require too much preparation or editing afterwards. He didn’t have a lot of time.

That night, with a mostly-decimated Dominos between them, Dan asked, “So how’d it go?”

“What?” Phil said, mouth full.

“Your video, you spoon.”

“Oh. Good. It’s finished.”

Dan raised an eyebrow. “What, already? Edited and everything?”

Phil nodded.

“Do I get to see it before you upload?” 

“No,” Phil said. 

“Why not?”

Phil shrugged. “I dunno. I want you to be surprised, I guess.”

A sharp exhale. “Don’t you think I’ve had enough surprises lately?”

“Dan --”

“Yeah, yeah, I know. We’re not talking about it. I’m just supposed to let MI6 drag you off to god-knows-where in less than two days.” Dan stood up from the sofa. “I’m going to bed. It’s your night to clean up.” He left Phil sitting on the sofa with half a slice of pizza still in his hand, mouth slightly open.

The next day was even worse. It was their last full day before the cavalry showed up. Dan couldn’t seem to find words to say to Phil, for once, and he kept avoiding eye contact. Phil felt powerless to do or say anything to make Dan -- or himself -- feel any better. Finally, around 3 in the afternoon, he told Dan he was going out for some fresh air. He didn’t ask Dan to join him, and Dan didn’t comment. He just waved him out the door with a vague, “See you.”

More than anything, at this point, Phil just wanted the waiting to be over.

When the morning arrived, Phil felt remarkably calm. The space next to him on the bed was empty despite the fact that the sun had barely risen, but he could smell coffee in the kitchen. 

He wandered in just in time for Dan to fill two mugs of the life-giving liquid. That little bit of prescience was enough to crack through the emotional defenses Phil had erected around himself over the last seven days. He bypassed the mug that Dan held out to him and wrapped his arms around Dan’s waist instead.

“I love you,” Phil said. He tucked his face into the crook of Dan’s neck.

Dan sighed and kissed Phil’s hair. “I know. I love you too”

Phil pulled back just enough to look Dan in the eye. “Everything’s going to be okay.”

Dan met his gaze without blinking. “Is it?”

“Yeah. It is.”

Dan pulled him back in and held him in silence for a moment before whispering, “We could run, you know.”

Phil tried to pull away again, but Dan wouldn’t let him.

“We could get fake passports. Move to the states and open up a coffee shop under our new identities. Seattle would be good -- go after Starbucks on their home turf. It’s a bold move, they won’t be expecting --”

Phil managed to wiggle an arm free and place his hand over Dan’s mouth. “Stop. We’re not running.”

“But --”

“We’re not. I can’t leave my family. They’d find us, anyway.” He didn’t need to specify who _they_ were.

Phil pulled free and picked up both coffee mugs. He handed one to Dan, who accepted it resignedly. 

“It’s going to be okay,” Phil repeated.

“Yeah, so you keep saying.” But Dan’s expression was fonder and less worried than it had been in days. Phil hoped he’d managed to transfer some of his new-found inner peace to Dan.

Anyway, it wasn’t like his words were completely empty. He had a plan.

The letter had told them to expect their visitors at 10 AM. That gave them time to eat breakfast, shower, and watch a few episodes of their most recent anime addiction. Dan didn’t bring up running again. If it weren’t for the fact that they were up much earlier than usual, and that Phil grabbed Dan’s hand as soon they sat down on the sofa, and Dan immediately used that as leverage to pull him into his chest, then it was almost like any other morning.

The knock at the door came at 10:01 AM.

Not that they’d spent the last ten minutes doing nothing but watch the hour tick nearer on their phones.

“Fucking beaurocrats, can’t even make it to an appointment on time,” Dan commented. 

Phil laughed. _Everything was going to be okay_. 

When Phil opened the door, he found two men in black suits on their doorstep. He almost laughed again, just because it was such a cliche.

“Good morning, Mr. Lester. May we come in?” The man on the left was the one who spoke. He was older, with gray hair and an impressive mustache. He was quite surly looking. The man on the right was probably the same age as Phil, and he just looked vaguely nervous. Both of them were shorter than Phil, which gave him some comfort, until he noticed the unmistakable outline of a firearm under both of their jackets.

“Yes. Come in.” Phil stepped back and allowed them to pass into the entryway. Dan had gotten up from the sofa and was standing by the kitchen counter, scowling. Phil shot him a quick warning look. “Have a seat,” he said, gesturing towards the chairs at the dining table.

“No, thank you,” the older agent said. “We can give you a few minutes to collect some personal items, but our superiors are actually expecting to have a conversation with you back at the office.”

“Oh. Right.” Phil glanced over at Dan again, this time asking for permission. Dan, though clearly confused, gave him a small nod. “I’ll come, as long as Dan can come, too.”

Now it was the two agents’ turn to exchange a meaningful glance. “I’m sorry, sir,” the older one said. “That won’t be possible.”

“Well, I’m not going anywhere without Dan,” Phil said. He hoped he still looked calm. Did he still feel calm? He wasn’t sure. His palms were sweating. He unclasped his hands and rubbed them on his jeans. He looked back to Dan for reassurance and got a grin in return. He knew it wasn’t entirely genuine, but the sight of Dan’s dimples was enough to lower his blood pressure a few points again.

“Mr. Lester,” the younger agent spoke for the first time, taking a step forward. “If you don’t come willingly, we are authorized to use force --”

Again, Phil had to fight the impulse to laugh at the cliche. Dan, however, was clearly not on the same wavelength anymore. “Don’t you fucking _dare_ threaten my boyfriend, you --”

“Dan!” Phil interjected. “Dan, it’s fine. I’m not going and they can’t force me.”

_God, this had better work._

“I assure you, Mr. Lester, we have every authority --” The older agent started again, but Phil just shook his head and held up a hand to silence him.

“No, I’m sorry. You don’t understand the situation. Neither do your superiors. You made a mistake. Several mistakes, actually. You shouldn’t have warned me that you were coming. You also should have done more research on me.”

“Phil, what are you doing?” Dan whispered. Phil ignored him.

“If you’d bothered to Google me, then you would have learned that I make videos online for a living. And I have a pretty sizable audience. So a couple days ago, I made a video.”

“Good for you, sir, but I fail to see how that’s relevant.”

“Oh.” Dan said. Something clicked for him. “ _Oh.”_

“Of course you do,” Phil continued to address the older agent, pointedly ignoring the younger one, who stood closer to him with one hand reaching under his jacket. “I made a video about _you_. Or your organization, anyway. Everything I know about it. Which actually happens to be quite a lot, since my father worked for you for so long.”

“Whatever you think you’re going to do with that video, I assure you that our tech team will sweep your computer and delete those files before you have a chance to upload them.”

“Yeah. I thought you might say that. Which is why the files aren’t on my computer, or even online. I saved them to a flash drive and delivered them to a friend yesterday by hand. You can’t trace that. Unless I go back to my friend, in person, and tell her not to upload that video, it’ll be online in 12 hours. Hundreds of thousands of people will know what shady crap you’re up to. And somehow I don’t think your superiors are eager to invite that kind of attention.”

Dan reached out and grabbed Phil’s hand. He squeezed back, hard.

The two agents were silent. The younger one’s hand stopped inching towards his gun. He looked to the other agent for guidance but found none; the older man’s face was twisted up in a grimace. 

“Fine,” the older agent finally said. “There’s no need for any hasty action. We’ll communicate with the office and wait for further instructions. But I assure you, Mr. Lester, this won’t be the last time you hear from us.” His mustache twitched. “Come on, Bradley,” he said to the other agent.

“Gentleman, let me show you out,” Dan said, jumping forward with the grin back on his face. He opened the front door and stretched his arm out towards the hallway. Both agents glared at them as they walked past. Dan barely waited for them to clear the threshold before he shut the door on their backsides. “Ha!” he yelled, spinning back around. “Phil Lester! You’re a _genius!”_

Phil’s legs felt shaky. He wobbled for a moment before collapsing into the nearest chair and putting his head in his hands. He didn’t know whether to laugh or cry, really.

“Hey,” Dan said, softer this time. Phil looked up to see him sitting next to him, his face close and his eyes shining. “It’s okay.”

“Yeah, it is. For now.”

Dan rubbed circles on his back, allowing Phil a moment to gather his thoughts.

“The thing is, they _will_ be back. I won’t be able to pull something like that again. And I’m not even sure that I want to. I _want_ to help people, Dan. Like my dad did. I just … I don’t want them to tell me what to do.”

“I know,” Dan said. “You don’t have to. You can find a way to do this on your terms.”

“What if I can’t?”

“You will. You’re Amazing Phil, remember? You can do anything. For some stupid fucking reason I forgot that this week, but I won’t make that mistake again.”

Phil smiled and leaned in to give him a quick kiss on the lips. “Thank you.”

“You’re welcome. About that, though. Why didn’t you just tell me what you were planning?”

“I didn’t know if it would work. I didn’t want you to get your hopes up. And I was scared. I should have told you, or talked to you about any of it. It’s possible I’m also stupid.”

“You’re definitely the stupidest genius I know.”

Phil slapped his arm. Dan didn’t look the least bit repentant.

“So now what? Dan asked.

“Well, first we should probably pay Bry a visit and stop her from uploading that video. Then, I don’t know. How does ‘whatever we want’ sound?”

“It sounds pretty good, actually.”

“Then what are we waiting for?”

**Epilogue (Five Minutes Later)**

“Are you dead set on taking the tube? We’d get there a lot faster if we fly --”

_“Phil.”_

**The End**

**Author's Note:**

> reblog on tumblr [here](https://olfrogbait.tumblr.com/post/190858711813/origin-story) :)


End file.
